Wednesday Games and Rest

I spent much of Wednesday haunted by a headache, which was likely caused by allergies; painkillers were in use. I was still unwinding from the long drives, too.

I rose after 7, and the coffee was ready when I found the kitchen; it had not moved. The weather, while not gray and totally overcast, the usual for the long March-April-May-June rain festival we used to get, included now broken clouds with sprinkles here and there. My tulips are ready to bloom, and more have appeared, and my rose bushes are breaking into new growth and bushing. My lawn service has edged, mowed, and cleaned up, and my backyard looks marvelous.

I wrote the blog after texting Deborah a good morning, signaling to her that the Pacific Northwest Time Zone is awake. I updated my transactions in Quicken. Mortgage, insurance, credit card payments, and utilities all seem to hit at the first of the month. I made toast with my homemade milk bread, poured liberal Fair Trade coffee into my cup, and found a banana to go with it.

Aside: Yesterday’s blog was the words were ‘fairly traded’ coffee, which might have been Grammarly AI not knowing what ‘Fair Trade’ was or I typed it wrong and nothing caught it. Deborah noticed it and let me know.

I wrote the blog and struggled with Grammarly missing spelling issues, but instead, the AI suggested a rewrite of my sentences. Still, instead of improving them, it was just changing the means, often to nonsensible wordings. I also discovered that I would select a minor update and discover words changed. Yikes!

I also started a rewrite of my first chapter and corrected the voicing to align better. I had slipped into an IT-guy narration of a system instead of storytelling. In other words, it was boring.

I reread the blog twice and made many more corrections (including missing Fairly Traded). I managed to get the blog published and, without rushing, was soon showered, shaved, dressed, and boarding Air VW the Gray. I headed to Cedar Hills Crossing and McMenamins for a beer and burger. I selected the Mystic burger, a non-meat product that is wonderful when fried like a patty over flames. I spoke to the manager there, and the Theology Pub room is booked for next Thursday (10 April starting at 6:30 for ten), but I will be flying to Michigan that day and will miss it.

I returned home. I rested a bit as the headache was a struggle. I got more painkillers and felt better. I added the board game Ruins of Arnak to our game choices in the EV’s cargo hold, had some crackers and hummus for a snack (I wanted to get some food with the painkillers), and watched more Star Wars episodes of Andor. I had forgotten much of this; it is a tour of the dark parts of the early times of the Star Wars Empire.

I headed to First United Methodist Church of Beaverton in the VW. I parked and walked to the nearby coffee place. Prices are higher now; for $20, they have a special of a coffee, sandwich, and a cookie, and that is what I selected. The turkey cheddar sandwich was recommended, and I got mine to go. I was not hungry after the snack and sat outside under a tent listening to the rain while I ate 1/2 a sandwich.

Soon, Dondrea, Z, and others showed. After a back-and-forth discussion, Z and I selected Scythe to play. We set it up for two, Andrew showed, and we added him. I quickly redid a teach as both of them had played before. I helped a few times, but soon Z and Andrew were pushing out on the map. Andrew started to push out, and Z, playing Blue (Norse), felt trapped between me, playing White (Poland), and Andrew, playing Red (Russia).

Scythe is a steampunk 4x game (4x explained here), and soon, conflicts and discoveries were telling. Battles were fought all over, and soon, all the players had battle stars. I had evacuated to my base area, but I was still chased down there! Andrew had to leave about 1/2 through the game, and Z got to play two factions against me. Z was fair and played them separately. As White (Poland), I get two choices from encounters and use this to build faster. Also, with the amount of combat I was taking (having lost most battles), my forces were centralized (losing move the defeated piece back to your starting base). I was three stars from ending the game. I was able to gain all three in one turn as I finished two items from my player board and a goal card, ending the game abruptly and winning with a score of 53 with zero popularity and two combat stars (officially making me a ‘Warlord’ in the types of winning track). Red (Andrew and then Z) was closer and, with more time, would have won. Blue (Z) failed to spread out but could have, and that would have scored high, but again, that would have required more time. It was good that I stopped the game when I did!

I was keyed up by coffee and the game. I watched two more Andor episodes (it is excellent) and went to bed late. I could not sleep. Read more Jutland from the American Commander published in 1936 and was surprised how close this book matches my current reading of WW1. There are hints of American First (the old one) as the author seems to appreciate the Central Powers’ position more. The book has no footnotes, which makes it less valuable to me. Still, the bibliography is detailed and lists many sources I have never even seen mentioned before, including the mysterious reference to the British Office of Stationary reports on Jutland.

I look forward to reading the analysis and facts presented in this time capsule of a book. Already, the book’s introduction mentions the handling of gunpowder as a problem for the British. With the story, often repeated, that the Germans learned to improve their handling of gunpowder after they nearly lost a battlecruiser in the Battle of Dogger’s Bank. I also learned that he affected battlecruiser, thinking it was doomed, fired it guns repeatedly to get off as many shells as possible, somehow firing in ten seconds. This I have never read before. I will have to check this story. It was indirectly claimed that the British battleship Lion was thus disabled and Tiger damaged by this desperate act. This sounds rather romantic.

The author ignores that the Germans had to run from the battle or be destroyed and that mis-signals caused the functional British battle cruisers to concentrate their fire on the doomed cruiser, Blücher. Had the British followed up with their attacks on the battle cruisers, it would have been a 4 to 3 fight with one German ship badly damaged; only luck would have saved the German ships. The author does say it was wrong to use the cruiser on this raid (it was).

Aside: The Germans ‘donated’ the battlecruiser Goeben to the Turks at the start of the war (the ship’s story here). Had they instead sent the Blücher, the battle would have been even (and the cruiser would still have been helpful as a ‘gift’ to the Turks), and with the proper gunnery and better German armor, it might have changed history. It is one of the gaming solutions, what-if scenarios, I mean to try someday. It would have been a bloody fight, and with Beatty not using his advantage of longer ranged guns and not training his gunner well, it could have gone to the Germans.

I must have slept as the time went from 1 to 5:30 in a blink and then to 6:30 in another blink. I remember no dreams, just waking. Though I felt like I had traveled somewhere and had just come back–dreams of Thanks for reading!